Synopses & Reviews
Dominique Eddés gripping novel tells the story of the doomed Jann family as they plot against one another for revenge and power. Kamal Jann, a successful lawyer in New York City, has a troubled past unseen to most. When he was a boy in Syria, his uncle, the head of the Syrian CIA, had his parents killed, leaving Kamal orphaned at the age of twelve. In a twisted attempt for forgiveness, and as insurance against retaliation, Kamals uncle paid for his education, leading to his eventual success. Now living in Manhattan, Kamal receives news that his uncle is planning a terrorist attack on Paris and has recruited Kamals jihadist brother to carry it out. To save his brother, and ultimately avenge his parents murder, Kamal enters into a dangerous pact with his uncle. Calm, reserved, and even charming on the surface, Kamal hides a vein of madness that will stop at nothing to bring down his uncle and the Syrian regime.
Alliances, damaged lives, impossible loves, and deep betrayals unfold as the family relationships erode, echoing the conflicts that tear apart the countries around them in the Middle East. Cousins are at odds; women and daughters are playing their own dark games; and the fortune teller, La Bardolina, has dangerous motives. Expertly translated by award-winning translator Ros Schwartz, and rendered in a voice that is raw, powerful, and rich in imagery, Kamal Jann has been hailed by the French critics as both universal and prophetic, a novel that is vital to our understanding of Syria and the Middle East.
Review
"A beautiful book, beautifully written with a pen dipped in line accuracy, the accuracy of the look, the talent of the sketch, without sacrificing the complexity of thought that underlies . . . This powerful fresco exposes the relationship between power and family, corruption and repression, sheds new light on what was believed to [be known of] Syria and the Middle East."
Review
"Dominique Eddé leads her reader with an iron hand. Reversals, speed, voltage constantly stirred, it gives Kamal Jann all the seductions of a spy novel, but never wanting to stop there, leaving the spiral of her plot to sink into dark areas, which go beyond the kind."
Review
"This novel is masterfully impressive."
Review
"A haunting evocation whose secret lies in Dominique Eddés unadorned writing, where irony mingles inextricably with the plight of a people prisoner to follies of its elite."
Review
"An impressive political and sentimental fresco about the destiny of a powerful Syrian family."
Review
"[A] tale of familial and political intrigue, a murky stew of byzantine alliances, betrayals, and hostilities. It is a well-told story of revenge and, whats more, a serious novel that contemplates what it means to accept your past."
Review
"Beautifully written."
Review
“Gripping . . . a novel of considerable power.”
Review
“Kamal Jann appears, for its seeming ability to read the palm of the future, like a work of history written in advance of the events which it recounts. . . . A richly nuanced novel of political, even polemical, drive.”
Synopsis
In a world rife with deceit, the fortunes of the divided Jann family echo the conflicts tearing apart the Middle East, Syria in particular. Set in Damascus, New York, Beirut, Tel Aviv and Paris, Dominique Eddés gripping novel contains elements of a Greek tragedyfratricide, strong women, alliances and misalliances of all hues, damaged lives and impossible loves. Betrayal is everywheremembers of the doomed Jann family plot against one another while CIA chief Weiner dupes his own agent, Jonathan Red. Similarly, in the Saudi Ben Zad family, cousins are at loggerheads and the British agent in the pay of head of the Syrian intelligence defects to Mossad. Women too stop at nothing in pursuit of their own ends. The influence of La Bardolina, the fortune-teller, is rivalled only by that of the 90-year-old Sitt Soussou, while her seemingly daughter Riwaya plays her own dark game. This is a decaying world undermined by decades of abuse and corruption, against which the Arab peoples rose in the spring of 2011.
The New Yorkbased Syrian lawyer Kamal Jann enters into a Faustian pact with the CIA in a desperate attempt to avenge his parents murder and to save his brother, Murad. Beneath the charm and reserve of this quiet man lies a vein of madnessJann, in Arabic, means to have gone mad. The time is that of urgency. It is the time of a collusion between an ancient past and a present sick of repeating itself and of the spread of blinkered Islamism. The space is that of the East fused with the West, mutually infiltrated and contaminated. Written in a language that is raw, powerful and rich in imagery, Kamal Jann has been hailed by the French critics as both universal and prophetic, a novel that is vital to our understanding of Syria and the Middle East.
About the Author
Born in Lebanon, Dominique Eddé is the author of several novels including Pourquoi il fait si sombre? (Why is it so Dark?) as well as an essay on Jean Genet and a book of interviews with the psychoanalyst André Green. She lives in Turkey.
Ros Schwartz has translated over 60 works of fiction and non-fiction, and is chair of English PEN’s Writers in Translation Program.
Table of Contents
1 The Same Day
2 Too Late
3 After
4 October